JABO, Sokoto — Sanusi Madabo, a 40-year-old farmer in the Nigerian village of Jabo, was preparing for bed Thursday night when he heard a loud noise that sounded like a plane crashing. He rushed outside his mud house with his wife to see the sky glowing a bright red.
The light burned bright for hours, Madabo said: “It was almost like daytime.”
He did not learn until later that he had witnessed a U.S attack on an alleged Islamic State camp.
U.S. President Donald Trump announced late Thursday that the U.S had launched a “powerful and deadly strike” against “ISIS Terrorist Scum in north-west Nigeria.” The Nigerian government has since confirmed the strike was a joint collaboration with the U.S government.
Residents of Jabo, a village in the northwestern Nigerian state of Sokoto, told The Associated Press in interviews Friday that they were seized with panic and confusion at the airstrikes.
They also said the village had never experienced a terror attack, even though attacks regularly occur in neighboring villages.
“As it approached our area, the heat became intense,” recalled Abubakar Sani, who lives just a few houses from the scene of the explosion.
“Our rooms began to shake, and then fire broke out,” he told the AP. “The Nigerian government should take appropriate measures to protect us as citizens. We have never experienced anything like this before.”
The Nigerian military did not respond to an AP request asking how many locations were targeted.
It’s a ‘new phase of an old conflict’
The strikes are the outcome of a months-long tense diplomatic clash between the West African nation and the U.S. that has evolved to result in a new form of cooperation.
The Trump administration has been claiming that Nigeria is witnessing a Christian genocide, a claim the Nigerian government has rejected, and which caused initial tensions.
But now Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the strikes resulted from intelligence sharing and strategic coordination between the two governments.
Yusuf Tuggar, Nigeria’s foreign minister, called the airstrikes a “new phase of an old conflict” and said he expected more strikes to follow.
“For us, it is something that has been ongoing,” Tuggar added, referring to attacks that have targeted Christians and Muslims in Nigeria for years.
Bulama Burkati, a security analyst on sub-Saharan Africa at the Tony Blair Institute, said the fear of residents is compounded by a lack of information.
Residents say there were no casualties, and security operatives have cordoned off the area.
But the Nigerian government has yet to release information about the militants who were targeted and the post-strike assessment of casualties.
“What can help in dousing the tension is for the American and Nigerian governments to declare who was targeted, what was attacked, and what has happened so far,” Burkati said. Such information is “still missing, and the more opaque the governments are, the more panic there would be on the ground, and that is what will escalate tension.”
Foreign fighters operated in Nigeria
Analysts say the strikes might have been intended for the Lakurawa group, a relatively new entrant to Nigeria’s complex security crisis.
The group’s first attack was recorded around 2018 in the northwestern region before the Nigerian government officially announced its presence last year. The composition of the group has been documented by security researchers as primarily consisting of foreigners from the Sahel region of Africa.
However, experts say ties between the Lakurawa group and the Islamic State are unproven. The Islamic State West African Province, a branch of ISIS in Nigeria, has its strongholds in the northeastern part of the country, where it is currently involved in a power struggle with its parent organisation, Boko Haram.
“What might have happened is that, working with the American government, Nigeria identified Lakurawa as a threat and identified camps that belong to the group,” Burkati said.
Either way, the local people feel vulnerable.
Aliyu Garba, a traditional leader in the village, told the AP that debris left by the strikes was scattered around and residents rushed to the scene before the arrival of security operatives. People picked up metal pieces hoping for valuable metal which they could trade, and he fears they could get hurt.
The strikes also rattled 17-year-old Balira Sa’idu as she prepared to get married.
“I am supposed to be thinking about my wedding, but right now I am panicking,” she said. “The strike has changed everything. My family is afraid, and I don’t even know if it is safe to continue with the wedding plan in Jabo.”
Adetayo and Omolehin write for the Associated Press. Adetayo reported from Lagos, Nigeria.
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